bushgang's Baghdad billboards - really

http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=17148

Billboard Politics

-snip-

Discussing the worries of civilians in Baghdad, where missiles are destroying hotels and suicide bombers are killing or wounding hundreds, the Times assured its readers that, "The United States is doing everything it can to fight their fears. All over the city, the occupying authorities have put up large billboards featuring bucolic scenes of date palms arched over a riverbank. Inspirational messages are splashed over the pretty pictures. 'Baghdad is getting better,' says one.'"

This sounds like the most cynical political satire. Iraqis have lived for decades with a constant barrage of optimistic pronouncements from Saddam Hussein's government, even as they lost wars and underwent suffering from an international embargo. They are among the least likely people on earth to believe cheery billboards that are contradicted by the evidence of their own eyes and the experiences of their friends and neighbors. They know propaganda all too well and, far from being comforted, will take it as a sign that the US intends to rule them like any other authoritarian government.

-snip-

Which is to say, it makes perfect sense for an American government to think that Iraqis will be comforted by billboards saying that everything is swell, even as they hear bombs exploding and see armored troops in their streets. American leaders are not used to a population that knows from long experience that the people giving orders and making optimistic predictions are probably not acting in its best interests.

Is it radical to suggest that the Iraqi skeptics may be right? That their eyes may indeed be more trustworthy than the billboards? Or even that Americans could learn a valuable lesson from their skepticism?
---------------------------

wonder what PR company they hired to do these billboards. Or is that a dept. of the military now? maybe it's the same crew that built the TV set for the press conf.

Get out your Victory Gin and drink a toast. :toast:

Jesus, is Baghdad already going to Clear Channel?!?!?

Sounds like the kind of Feel-Good/Do-Nothing crap my local Chamber of Commerce buys into.

Sign Up Now For Duty!

Victory for Ingsoc!

:eyes:

Sounds familiar...

...with a bit of 1984 and Total Recall thrown in as well.

It's all sort of starting to blur together into one dystopic nightmare, you know?

but this is ridiculous.

The "Dept. of Really Big Banners" ???


CARTOONS! The "Dept. of Really Big Banners" Edition

sadly, I can't say the same for Americans...

Or the morgue.

Replacement for the Saddam statue.... Featuring AWOL in his flight suit costume. That'll help the Iraqis realize how great their lives are now.

no text

Just like home. It works here, why not Iraq? The RW sheeple buy it, right? :eyes:

As if people living in Baghdad don't know what is going on in their own fucking city.

Clearly some billboard company in the U.S. gave money to AWOL and this is payback.